Born Again Gym Rat: These New Gloves Aren't Working For Me

Thursday, January 8, 2015

These New Gloves Aren't Working For Me

Left: old pink gloves.
Right: new black palmless gloves.

I'm totally bummed. Not only are the two Nexersys machines at the gym completely flaky in different ways, but my new gloves are failing me as well. I put moleskin over my right ring and pinky knuckles before using sports tape, and then cotton wraps. I'm careful to use band-aids on both my pointer fingers before ensconcing them in sports tape because last week's seam burn was really painful. Even though I have a hard time stuffing my hands into the new gloves, I'm still sliding a bit. So when I'm done, my knuckles are bruised pink, and I've taken the skin off my left index knuckle. Left? The jab left? Oh jeeze... I steal a bit of the dit da jow I bought for my husband for Christmas and dab it on my bruises. They immediately feel better. The skinned knuckle gets a pair of criss-cross band-aids. We'll see how long that stays on.

Afterwards, I got on the elliptical for 2 min of steady state and then 8 minutes of Tabata: 15 seconds On (maxing at 276 Strides Per Minutes) followed by a gasping 45 seconds Off (55-60 SPMs). A quick stretch and then off to the locker room to peel off all these soggy clothes, and shower. The Korean woman asks me today if I'm a "sportswoman" and I look at her puzzled while replying, "Uh, no." She has no follow-up questions so I put my earpiece back in. Later, a tall older woman asks me if boxing the machine is fairly intuitive, and if she'll need gloves. Well, the front desk offers loaner gloves, but I wouldn't want to use someone else's sweaty gear. There's a tutorial but that's impossible to hear above ambient background din.

The Left machine is stuck with its touchy keyboard and overly-sensitive sensors. It goes a bit whacky during one round and doesn't register any of my power kicks. It also goes blank screen dead at least half a dozen times from a cross or a good hook. After doing 5 rounds of the Intermediate Program, I move to the Right machine which still has my beginner settings from when I logged in last. 7 rounds at Beginner should be easy. Instead it's annoying, again, because it doesn't register the Lead Kick, and is overly sensitive to the Power Dig. The sensors are whacked out as well. My jabs are registering at 140%, yet my cross is averaging 55-80%. And I absolutely know my right cross is a lot more powerful than my left jab. So I can't trust any of the readings on either machine. Bummer. But I got a good cardio workout.

Thursday Workout